Climbing (EmmaJack + FMT)
Notes On CLIMBING
(EmmaJack + The FURICO Music Team)
Track Data
Composition tool: MuseScore, Studio One 5 Professional
Recording tool (DAW): Studio One 5 Professional
Number of tracks:103
Sound source: Presence XT, Impact XT, Mai-Tai, Mojito (All built-in sound sources of Studio One), TAL-NOIZEMAKER
Composition and Recording period: Nov 28 2020 - Dec 21 2020
[Background]
(TI writes:)
I think it was about a year ago that I started to communicate with Emma Jack. I found out about her SC account somehow, and I was listening to her music from time to time, and she sent me a DM, which I think was the trigger. Probably around the same time as Allen Anderson, who I co-produced "Alaska" with.
I used to listen to her original song*, which is an alternative rock song with a relaxed tempo.
Then, when I heard her playing this song on YouTube, I jokingly said, "I think there is actually an original synth-pop version of this song, and you're playing an unplugged version of it. So I decided to create the original version. I had in my head a synth-pop song similar to Yazoo or Erasure.
So, the basic structure and chord progression is the same as this YouTube version. However, since this is FMT, I added various harmonies and twisted rhythms.
[EmmaJack: "it was a big surprise"]
(Emma writes:)
For my part, I have been producing music for about 2 years, beyond the pleasure of creation, I quickly discovered another pleasure i.e. sharing with others. I'm curious, and I like to listen to the productions of the people who listen to my music.
This is how I got to know TI, met through SoundCloud, by listening to the music he produces with his "team".
I must say that their music has always seemed a little strange and very atypical to me, but it's very creative and I like to discover all kinds of music :-)
When TI told me that he was hearing another version of Climbing, more danceable, I was curious to see what this Japanese team could do with my song, so I quickly proposed to him to try to make his own version.
I often make several versions of my songs, I do it spontaneously alone.
I am always interested when other artists offer to remix or produce their own version of one of my songs.
Aor Agni, a French electro artist, has already remixed several of my tracks, and Jeff Roberts, an American artist, has also produced his version of one of my tracks. It's always a great pleasure to see people enjoying my music to the point of wanting to offer their own version.
Each time, it's very exciting , surprising and a bit frightening too :-)
When I discover these versions made by other musicians, it's like opening a surprise gift, and I love surprises :-) ,
The first listening can be weird, because the produced version can be quite far from the original track, and sometimes I am a bit lost because my original intention has disappeared and has been replaced. I often need several listenings to understand and appreciate the new song.
When I received the FMT version, I must say that it was a big surprise, but a good surprise! I have to admit that I was a little anxious..
They surprised me because they succeeded, very quickly, to transpose the structure of the song quite faithfully but with new instruments. I immediately heard the great quality of their work. The sounds used seemed to me interesting because they are very far from the ones I usually use. I work mostly with my guitars, my piano and a few virtual instruments.
They sent 2 tracks, one instrumental and one with my voice cut out so that I have an idea of what it would sound like.
My part of the work was quick and easy because I just needed to re-record the voices on their instrumental track.
Then they worked, they refined their version little by little until they got this last version.
I have been very impressed by their efficiency and the great quality of their work, they have a much better experience than me, especially for the mixing.
I find this version very interesting and more swinging.
Thanks to TI and TM for this great experience!
[Arrangement]
(TI writes:)
For myself, I envisioned a Yazoo or Erasure type of music. The characteristic of Vince Clarke, the producer of these units, is that he basically uses a combination of single melodies to express harmony and build backing tracks. His music is very pop and easy to listen to, but the structure itself is more like a classical symphony than pop music.
I think this method of expressing harmony by combining single melodies is a very effective method in today's programming-centered music. In fact, when expressing harmony, it is clearly better to intertwine single melodies than to simply use guitar or piano tones to express harmony. In my opinion, playing chords on guitar or piano is more like a rhythm instrument than a harmony instrument. When I arrange a guitar or piano phrase with chords, I treat it more like a rhythm instrument than a harmony instrument.
Other than that, I tried to include all the best parts of synth-pop from the past, such as New Order, Visage, Depeche Mode, and so on. It's got all the elements of synth-pop that I like.
In that sense, I thought this song didn't meet the "never heard before" part of the "create a sound that I've never heard before and that I want to hear now" part, but as a song structure, it has all the elements of FMT, such as rhythms that don't repeat, and the use of dissonance. I don't think they write harmonies like this, and I don't think they create rhythms like this.
I think that's the reason why FMT is FMT.
The basic structure and chord progression is based on the version played on YouTube, but the interlude part is our original.
The phrases and harmonies are taken from a phrase that I first co-wrote with TM over 30 years ago. TM wrote a rough harmony for this part, and I realized that it was the same chord progression that he had created as an interlude when we were writing an original song for the band to play 30 years ago. He probably doesn't remember it (he doesn't remember most things, or doesn't want to remember them).
The song was never finished, but I had this melody and counter-melody in mind at the time, and I used it completely.
As for the rhythm, I had a simpler phrase in my head, but TM, as usual, created a rhythm that is simple at first listen, but quite complex. This is one of the reasons why it's not just synth-pop.
The rhythm is an even kick, so it sounds for a moment like typical dance music, but the hi-hat and snare accents are not like that at all.
Gary Rees, who did the mastering for me, pointed out the similarities between this and the rhythm on the British band "Japan" (Steve Jansen). He also wrote a commentary on "Etude For Samplers," which was released at the same time, and made some very pertinent and perceptive points.
(TM writes:)
I well understood what TI meant by the concept of arranging Emma’s Climbing in an electronic-pops manner. The first thing I did was further arrangement of the score roughly arranged by TI.
I was planning arrangement like the British band ABC (but FMT-esque) and one to develop the groove. ABC does not have typical synthpop characteristics, though. But it was completely failure; not fit at all. Then I went for something like Pet Shop Boys and New Order. To be honest, I was a bit surprised that I wrote them very quickly and they were so cool.
As TI writes above, Gary indicated the rhythm is common with Japan, but I did not take that into account this time. Anyhow, since Steve Jansen is one of the drummers who have had the most impact on me, that is highly likely. (In making the Introductory synth phrase I recalled their European Son.)
An image I had was a high, steep mountain with snow on its ground. The weather quickly and unpredictably changes from clear to blizzard.
One of the means to express that is to use slash chords several times. The bass remains on F, which is the original bass note for bar 4 (out of the 4-bars pattern).
In terms of the drums, I am feeling this track is a sister of "Mad Disco." It's four on the floor but has hidden stresses off the beats. But while Mad Disco has them off beats 1 and 3, Climbing off beats 2 and 4 (which shift later in the track). The wood block (or clap) plays in Mad Disco, whereas the tambourine does here. That was my intention.
As for the work we did decades ago, as TI pointed out, no, I don't remember it at all. Extremely often I prefer creating from zero again rather than remembering something. :)
(TI writes:)
As TM explained the intention of slash chords, in pop music after the rise of soul music, especially in dance music, the bassline became a component of harmony as well as a component of rhythm. In this case, the bassline is often a percussive phrase, and the harmonic element is diluted. To compensate for this, I wrote another bass line to supplement the harmony, assuming the sound of a cello, choir, or synth.
This is played in the upper band (sometimes lower) than the synth bass, which is played in F all the time, so that they don't overlap.
I also adjusted the synth bass, which is always in F, to be more percussive and to form a bass rhythm with the bass drum, as described below.
[On the production process and vocal mix with Emma Jack]
(TI writes:)
The structure of the song and the arrangement process started with me writing a simple notation, rhythm and bass line from Emma's YouTube version and giving it to TM. I then added strings and other sustained single-note phrases. This work was completed in a few days.
At this point, at TM's suggestion, I increased the tempo slightly to 123 BPM. I transferred it to Studio One, created a rough backing, and sent it to Emma to sing, complete with clicks and guide chords.
That weekend she sang about three takes and sent us the file. We started mixing in earnest based on that.
The vocal track is sung in a different way from the original, with different nuances. I think she changed her singing style to match the tempo and the mood of the song. She also changed the phrasing of the vocalise before the interlude, and sang it in a way that intertwined well with our strings. I think our string arrangement and her vocal line intertwined very well.
Therefore, matching the vocals and backing was done in a matter of seconds. In the past, when we worked with singers, the song was done first and then the backing, so it took a long time to synchronize the song and the backing.
In contrast, this time she sang along with our backing track, and her singing was very accurate in terms of tempo and key, and there was not much difference in singing style between takes, so it was very smooth to correct and replace the noisy parts.
(However, in the ending, when the tempo was slowed down, she was not satisfied with the way she sang the song, so I replaced it.）
For the vocal part, I used 20 tracks, including the chorus part. Basically, I piled up three mono processed identical tracks, placed them in the center of the track when the Sequence was sounding on the left and right, and kept the center of the track when the song was in full swing, while spreading the two tracks to the left and right and applying reverb and delay processing.
There are techniques to create multiple vocal tracks and detune them or apply short delays to add depth to the vocals, but I did not use such techniques this time. I tried it, but it didn't make her voice sound appealing (I used that technique a lot in my work with Allen Anderson (Alaska)).
Therefore, the sound is basically just equalization and compressor, almost non-effect, with reverb and delay as reverberation.
This is partly because many of her other songs have a lot of reverb, and I wanted to hear her dry voice.
Up to this point, things went very smoothly. However, it was a long way from here.
[Mixing]
Because our tracks have a large number of sounds and, in addition, because of the complex interplay of single-note melodies, including vocal lines, it took a lot of work to mix the vocal so that they could be heard properly.
In addition, although we were conscious of the need to avoid overlapping sound ranges during the MuseScore stage, in reality, each track's tone contains extra bandwidth, so detailed adjustments were necessary.
In order to solve this problem, I measured the bandwidth of each track, created a list of localization and bandwidth placement for each track, and placed them accordingly.
This resulted in a clean sound, but there were a few places where the lyrics became difficult to hear.
In such cases, I cut the lyrics into syllables and changed the equalization and compression values, starting with the volume of each part in that section. This process took the most time and effort.
I also spent a lot of time on the placement of the low frequency parts in particular.
I used two types of bass drums (total of four sound sources), two types of bass lines (total of four sound sources), and two types of bass lines (total of four sound sources).
However, when I actually played them, there were many parts where the reverberations and attacks interfered with each other, so I adjusted the waveforms of each track and also adjusted the waveforms of the effects that were applied (the adjustment of the effects was a blind spot). Adjusting the effects is a blind spot. (Adjusting the effects is a blind spot, as the interference in the sound source itself has been eliminated, so when auditory problems occur, it's often the effects that are affecting the sound.
For specific techniques, I refer to the low frequency processing methods in EDM, which is a field I'm not really interested in musically, but acoustically it's very ingenious and often helpful in mixing.
For example, I divided the high frequency attack part of the BD (mainly 200Hz) and the low frequency part (50-100Hz), and placed multiple sound sources. For the attack part, I cut off the release and placed it in the center in mono. For the low frequency part, I cut the waveform of the attack part, and while keeping the localization in the center, I widened it slightly, and narrowed down the sound image so that the bass line would be in the center.
The interplay between the BD and bass was arranged musically so that they do not overlap on MuseScore, but even so, there are places where the release and attack overlap, so I cut the release tightly to the note and then applied a side-chain compressor so that they do not overlap.
Also, in the overall mix, I try to keep other sounds out of the vocal core (100hz and up) so that the bandwidth and localization of the vocal part do not overlap. On the other hand, I cut the low frequency part of the vocals (below 100hz) so that the bass and BD would sound good and the vocals would not be hard to hear.
However, I'm still wondering if this is the right mix for this version, or if there is a better way to make it sound. I think all the sounds are coming out as intended, but I'm still not sure if the original Groove is coming out.
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